Welfare: A white Secret

(1) Come on, my fellow white folks, we have something to confess. No, nothing to do with age spots or those indoor-tanning? creams we use to get us through the winter without looking like the final stages of TB. Nor am I talking about the fact that we all go home and practice scaring dance moves behind drawn shades. Out with it, friends, the biggest secret known to whites since the invention of powdered rouge?: welfare is a white program. Yep. At least it’s no more black than Vanilla Ice is a fair rendition of classic urban rap.

(2) The numbers go like this: 61% of the population receiving welfare, listed as “means-tested cash assis-tance” by the Census Bureau, is identified as white, while only 33% is identified as black. These numbers not-withstanding, the Republican version of “political correctness” has given us “welfare cheat” as a new term for African American since the early days of Ronald Reagan. Yet if the Lakers were 61% white and on a winning streek?, would we be calling them a “black team”?

(3) Wait a minute, I can hear my neighbors say, we’re not as slow at math as the Asian Americans like to think. There’s still a glaring disproportion there. African Americans are only 12% of the population as a whole, at least according to the census count, yet they’re 33% of the welfare population — surely evidence of a shocking ad-diction to the dole?.

(4) But we’re forgetting something. Welfare is a program for poor people, very poor people. African Ameri-cans are three times as likely as whites to fall below the poverty level and hence to have a chance of qualifying for welfare benefits. If we look at the kind of persons most likely to be eligible — single mothers living in poverty with children under 18 to support — we find little difference in welfare participation by race: 74.6% of African Americans in such dire straits are on welfare, compared with 64.5% of the poor white single moms.

(5) That’s still a difference, but not enough to imply some congenital? appetite for a free lunch on the part of the African-derived. In fact, two explanations readily suggest themselves: First, just as blacks are ______ likely to be poor, they are disproportionately likely to find themselves among the poorest of the poor, where welfare eligibility arises. Second, the black poor are more likely than their white counterparts to live in cities, and hence to have a chance of making their way to the welfare office.

(6) So why are they so poor? I can see my neighbor asking as visions of slack idlers dance before his nar-rowed eyes. Ah, that is a question white folks would do well to ponder. Consider, for a start, that African Americans are more likely to be disabled (illness being a famous consequence of poverty) or unemployed (in the sense of actively seeking work) and far less likely to earn wages that would lift them out of the wel-fare-eligibility range.

(7) As for the high proportion of black families headed by single women (44%, compared with 13% for whites): many deep sociohistoric reasons could be referred to, but none of them is welfare. A number of re-spected studies refute the Reagan-era myth that a few hundred a month in welfare payments is a sufficient in-centive to desert one’s husband or get pregnant while in high school. If it were, states with relatively high wel-fare payments — say, about $500 a month per family — would have higher rates of out-of-wedlock births than states like Louisiana and Mississippi, which expect a welfare family to get by on $200 a month or less. But this is not the case.

(8) So our confession stands: white folks have been swallowing up the welfare budget while blaming someone else. But it’s worse than that. If we look at Social Security, which is another form of welfare, although it is often mistaken for an individual insurance program, then whites are the ones who are crowding the trough. We re-ceive almost twice as much per capita, for an overall advantage to our race of $10 billion a year — much more than the $ 3.9 billion advantage African American gain from their disproportionate share of welfare. One sad reason: whites live an average of six years longer than African Americans, meaning that young black workers help subsidize a huge and growing “over-class” of white retirees. I do not see our confession bringing much re-lief. There’s a reason for resentment, though it has more to do with class than with race. White people are poor too, and in numbers far exceeding any of our more generously pigmented? social groups. And poverty as de-fined by the government is a vast underestimation of the economic terror that persists at incomes — such as $20,000 or even $40,000 and above — that we like to think of as middle class.

(9) The problem is not that welfare is too generous to blacks but that social welfare in general is too stingy? to all concerned. Naturally, whites in the swelling “near poor” category resent the notion of whole races sup-posedly indulging over their expense. Whites, near poor and middle class, need help too — as do the many African Americans, Hispanics and “others” who do not qualify for aid but need it nonetheless.

(10) So we white folks have a choice. We can keep pretending that welfare is black program and a scheme for transferring our earnings to the pockets of shiftless, dark-skinned people. Or we can clear our throats, blush prettily and admit that we are hurting too — for cash assistance when we’re down and out, for health insurance, for college aid and all the rest.

(11) Racial scapegoating? has its charms, I will admit: the surge of righteous anger, even the fun — for those inclined — of wearing sheets and burning crosses. But there are better, nobler sources of white pride, it seems to me. Remember, whatever they say about our music or our taste in clothes, only we can truly, deeply blush.

【参考译文】福利制度：白人的秘密

(1)来吧，我的白种同胞们，我们得好好坦白一下。不谈老人斑的事，也不谈我们擦了古铜肤色乳液来度过漫长的冬天，只为了不让自己看起来苍白得像是患有晚期肺痨的样子。我也不是在说那件大家都在做的事：回到家，拉起窗帘，偷练新潮舞步。勇敢地说出来吧，朋友们，这是发明腮红粉饼以来白人之间最大的秘密：福利制度是为白人设的。没错，如果要说福利制度是黑人的，那等于说凡尼拉? 艾丝（香草冰）是正统都市拉普音乐的代名词一样：同样是违反事实。

(2)实际数字显示，接受福利援助的人口，在人口普查局记录中列为“经查验谋生能力，予以现金援助”的这一类，其中有61% 是白人，而黑人只占33%。虽然统计数字俱在，可是自从里根年代初期开始，共和党式的“政治立场正确”用语中“诈骗福利金的骗子”，就仿佛成了非裔美国人的同义词。但是，假如洛杉矶湖人队中有61% 是白人，并且一路奏捷，到那时我们还会叫它“黑人球队”吗？

(3) 等等！——我可以听到我的邻居说着——我们的数学能力还不至于像亚裔美国人所想的那么差。这些比例数据当中还有很大的误差。非裔美国人只占全美人口12%，至少人口普查结果是这样。可是他们却占了领取福利金人口的33%——这绝对是黑人极度倚赖救济金的铁证。

(4) 可是我们忘了一点。福利制度是为收入微薄，尤其是特别穷困的人办的。非裔美国人当中收入不及最低标准，因而可以符合领救济金资格的比例，是白人的三倍。假如我们挑出一种最可能符合救济资格的人——单身妈妈贫户，家中有未满18岁的子女要抚养的——那么接受福利救助的人就没有什么种族差异了：非裔美国人的单亲妈妈贫户有74.6% 在领救济金，白人贫户的单身妈妈则有64.5% 靠救济。

(5) 这两项数字之间显然仍有差距，可是差别不大，不足以用来解释非洲血统的人先天就特别喜欢白吃的午餐。有两个原因可以解释这个差别。第一，黑人不仅贫穷的比例偏高，而且其中大多数是赤贫阶级。这点就足够让他们符合领救济金的基本条件。条二，和白人穷人比起来，有比较多的黑人贫困户住在都市，因而较有机会到社会福利处领救济金。

(6) 他们穷要怪谁呢？——我可以看到我的邻居质问着，他的双眼眯起，眼前舞动着好吃懒做的黑人影像。唉！这个问题，白人倒真应该好好的思考一番。譬如，可以先想想这一点：非裔美国人残障的比例就偏高（大家都知道贫穷容易带来疾病），也很容易失业（不是不积极去找工作），而且又不容易有够高的收入使自己脱离对救济金的依赖。

(7)至于黑人家庭之中单身妈妈的比例为什么特别高（比例高达44%，白人之中的单身妈妈则只占13%），其原因可以从许多社会、历史的层面来探究，可是都和社会福利无关。里根时代制造出一种神话——区区一个月数百元的救济金给付就足以诱使黑人妇女弃夫出走或是在高中时代就怀了孕。这种说法已遭到好几项有分量的研究所驳斥。如果神话属实，那么，相较于像路易斯安那和密西西比这些月付在200元以下的州，救济金给付额度高的州——比如说一个家庭月付500元——非婚生子的比例应该比较高。可是实际情形并非如此。

(8) 所以，我们理当坦承：白人一直在吞吃福利预算，却怪在别人头上。可是事实尚不只于此。光看社会安全制度就可以了解全局。社会安全也是一种福利，虽然它常被误认为是一种个人的保险计划。在社会安全制度中独享其利的是白人。非裔美国人固然以过高比例在领取社会福利金。总金额达到39亿美元，可是在社会安全给付方面，我们白人平均每人领取的金额几乎是黑人的两倍，总金额更是高达一年100亿美元，几乎是39亿美元的三倍之多。这其中有一项颇为悲哀的原因：白人领得多，是因为他们的平均寿命比黑人多六岁。这表示年轻的黑人工人要帮助补贴一个庞大而且日渐增加的“上层阶级”——白种退休人员。尽管如此，我们的这番自白看不出能带来多大的帮助。社会福利引起的憎恨其来有自，可是其中涉及阶级的因素超过种族的因素。白人也很穷，而且总数还超过其它皮肤色素比较发达的社会团体。此外，政府所界定的贫穷标准，完全无法反映经济恐慌——它存在于我们惯称的中产阶级，像是年收入2万美元甚至4万美元以上这个阶级。

(9) 问题的关键不在于社会福利对黑人太优渥，而在于整个的福利制度对一切需要帮助的人太吝啬，当然，日渐增多的“接近贫穷”阶级的白人一想到有整个种族好像在享受他们的付出，便会忿忿不平。其实，接近贫穷者和中产阶级的白人他们本身也需援助，此外还更有许多非裔美国人、西裔美国人与“其他”人种，他们虽然不符合援助标准，可是仍然需要帮助。

(10)于是，我们白人面临一项抉择。我们可以继续自欺欺人，假装福利制度是黑人制度，是将我们所得转移到懒惰无能的黑皮肤人种的口袋的计划。或者，我们可以清清喉咙，很矜持地脸红一下，承认我们也在受苦，在不如意时需要救济金，需要医疗保险，需要大专教育援助等各式各样的帮助。

(11) 我承认，以别的种族来做代罪羔羊，有它迷人的地方：可以陶醉于突发的义愤中，甚至对于有此癖好的人来说，可以从中获取头顶白床单，焚烧十字架的乐趣。可是我觉得白种人能从更好、更高贵的事物当中发现他们的骄傲。记住，不论他们怎么说我们的音乐或我们穿衣服的品味，只有白种人能真正的、深度的脸红。